Of Monsters and Men

We were able to catch a ship with the white cosairs. Bo was able to rally the rowers. We were able escape their clutches. A couple of days later we arrive at Giant’s Tomb Island. We make landfall. We see our ship heading out a day later.

We find our way to Castle Dessa for the Knights of the North.

WE approach this castle, and we see two Knights of the North (unarmed) exit some large doors and kneels down to address Aiden. (Not Nel!)

Tonic is recognized by Aiden as one of the senior Knights.

We come in the castle, there’s a high skylight into the ceiling. It’s old dwarven architecture. They show Nel the lower level where they expect him to put Irontusk.

Bo is hurt real bad from the demon. The demon caused this. Brom is doing all he can to heal the wounds but he is only able to treat what he can see. He plans to hold on till morning to use the sun to try to heal him.

… Meanwhile Aedin is helping a knight, Glenn, he’s gathering things for him. He’s seen some orcs in the area. Grizzit is more active and things seem to looking up. The weather has been rainy, dark and cold. As the dawn gets in

Back to Brom and Bo. Brom has the circle set up and starts casting a spell to help. Brom has some wildflowers surrounding Bo. Cuthumb is looking at them in awe and the flowers start to become one like a large circle. There’s some energy in the air and its then that Bo opens his eyes but they are not like his own. They are all black. Bo kicks out with his leg while he’s speaking in an orcish tone. This breaks the circle of flowers. He get up, says, “RUNTHEMDOWN! KILLTHEMALL!” Then he starts running into the woods.

…Aedin at this time cast this spell it was ‘cute’. He feels something extra, coming through the clearing near them. Leaves come up off the ground near him and they go from green to red in a moment. A torrent of wind is passing. Crashis starts to fill in to the form of Crashis. Aedin thought he’d hear a whisper and here he is. Crashis’s form grabs a stick and it forms a spear. He throws the spear to a bush and the bush trembles and falls. He’s saying something. It’s “Run, Run!”. A large figure is running towards the clearing from the other side of the clearing. Aedin steps back. The figure has large black tattoos and rips a branch off of a tree. Large man has a overlayed orc and the branch has an overlayed sword and is coming at Crashis. Aedin cuts the spell short and runs to the temple.

…Brom, Cuthumb, and Nel run after Bo. Bo’s yelling and screaming at this pile of flying leaves. We see another figure in the clearing stepping back. As Nel gets in the area and some things that look like arrows coming towards us but not at us. Bo grabs a pile of leaves with his hand presses it hard against the tree, then with his other hand uses his branch sword and swings it at the trunk. It breaks. The leaves all fall. Bo fall, he looks exhausted and falls to his knees. All the leaves fall. The figure in the distance sees us. We look at him like, “What just happened”.

Aedin approaches the fallen man. He asks towards us if he can help us. Bo’s tattoos are completely black. Bo tells him, “PLEASE, he was cursed by a demon.” Aedin feels the negative energy. Aedin says he needs more help then he can give here but he has a place. We get Bo on the back of Iron Tusk and walk up to the temple. There’s stones set up. Brom seems more calm. Nel is feeling like he’s having Deja vu. It seems like a holy place for the Knights of the North. We hear a waterfall in the distance. There’s an opening in hill. There’s some stones with some stones set up in a very particular way. It’s too small for Iron Tusk. It’s dimly lit in here, there’s some carvings into the walls and there’s a pool that seems very serine. Bo is lowered into the pool. Aedin pours water over him its as if he’s washing the negativity away.

The blackness starts to pool up into parts of the tattoos. Then it seeps around and the dark water seems to be surrounding Aedin. It looks like black oil. Brom starts to say some words in something I can’t understand. When he touches the water words the light gets darker in the pool. The blackness starts to congeal togehter and starts taking the form of a bat and starts to slop over the edge. Nel sees this evil black creature rising from the pool. Cuthumb starts at it with a sword. The thing starts flying towards Nel. Nel is hit with this thing and is flown back. For a moment there’s no tattoos on Bo. Aedin says we did it!

There’s some residue on Nel now from that bat. It is silky. Bo starts to wake up. He says, “Lissa and Serna are in trouble.” WIth that Aedin says, “I have a friend in need of help too.”

So right now we have Nel, the boar rider, knight of the north. Cuthumb, halfling ranger. Brom…, Bo, naked man. Degarius, NPC.

We ask where he went. Aedin tells us he was going North but he was being more secretive.

Aedin introduces himself as a Elfish wizard. We agree to start tracking Crashis. We pick up the trail, and lose it and find it a few times. We’ve made some progress but this Crashis has hidden his tracks much better then we’d thought. We find Lyssa’s tracks (thanks to Degarius’s cat) and then eventually find Crashes a bit later and he appears slain. There’s goblin and orc blood. He is in some red-amber armor. He must have died protecting someone.

We pay our respects and continue tracking who we thought he was protecting… Lyssa.
We track the group of orcs and goblins and catch up. There’s about 10 of them. Goblins start firing at us.

As we are leaving the town we look back and was pretty surprised that they had such large army. They’ve really taken over the town. We hope people are going to get their things back. There is not a lot of respect. Will there be a Rangwood after this?

Our plan was to range to the point the army asked us to range to and send back the militia. One of them will not want to return to the Empire army. Then we will continue onward to Hammerhold.

We have a few horses, and a cart. Nel, Irontusk, Bo, Brom, Cuthumb, Oxon, Degarius, Degarius’s cat, Astrid (Militia 1 from the town that vanished, has a spear and a shield), and Luscious (from Rangwood, and he has a bow and short sword Militia 2).

We are quarter mile out of town and then we hear a noise, sounds like someone is coming through the woods in our direction. A guy comes out and says “Brom! Brom! It is good to see you.” Brom remembers this guy vaguely, his name is Martin. Brom has gotten into trouble with this guy before. Brom says, “Good to see you, how are things going?” He starts removing his Empire clothes and says that the Empire is not for him. He asks to join us on our travel towards Hammerhold. He had overheard us talking about it, (where?). During the day we did spot a goblin scout at one point. We leave him alone and stay clear of trouble.

Night’s fast approaching, and we start to look for shelter. We find a lean-to, we leave Oxon in the covered wagon and set up a fire. Oxon starts to move around starts asking questions about what happened. It starts raining and sleeting. The weather is frightful. Oxon approaches the fire. Brom starts telling him about his demon dream and how the they felt the demon was in or near the Rangwood.

Oxon suggests if you guys are going to be holding up here around the lean-to we should do some ritual magic. Bo says the Lyssa and Serna left the group earlier. Cuthumb tells him that they would be back at the town. Eventually he listens. Oxon continutes to tell us we would need three basic items to call on the old spirits. There’s a flower that has a bleek face. Nel saw one back down the road. Oxon has a few mineral compounds on him but he also needs bat eyes or raven eyes.

Cuthumb goes looking for a bird nest. He hands a bird to Oxon. Oxon proceeds to do something with this bird to prepare the spell. Cuthumb and Martin were speaking about things particularly how the Empire sucks and to Heck with them. While that conversion is happening, Nel returns with flowers and seeks out Brom to talk about Martin, out of his earshot.

Their conversation is about weather or not they trust him. They are going to use a spell to find if someone has bad motives towards the group.

Nel, Oxon, and Brom return to the campfire and start invoking the spell. Oxon throws in the flowers and there’s a white flash. Some powder is tossed into the fire, then the bird parts. The fire roars up after Oxon throws something into the flame. Brom feels his family is the Rangers. This feeling taps into the spell. When Oxon places the final component. A pheonix leaves the fire the sparks and embers start to die out. The bird of smoke and ask fly over Cuthumb, pauses, past Martin, towards Nel. Oxon jumps up and says, “It’s on to something, there are bad, very bad intentions.” Degarius jumps up. His cat hisses. Cuthumb asks how they did this, it looks cool. The bird flutters around Nel, Nel spins with it and it flies right into the pony.

The pony starts approaching the Nel. Nel draws his sword. The pony opens it’s mouth and its mouth splits. It would intimated most people. The body of the pony starts to change shape. Nel is “Kin to Irontusk” and is still intimidated. The thing roars at Nel. Spikes start coming out of it. It’s legs get bigger, the hoofs break apart. Nel tucks behind Irontusk and pulls his spear out. Martin says, “What the hell!”. Oxon says it’s a demon! Brom had pulled his bow out when the bird flew towards Nel. Brom sees tentacles coming out of it’s side. Nel switches to the spear. Brom takes a shot with his bow. It appears to have no affect on the pony demon. A tentacle pulls the horse pull into the pony’s mouth. Cuthumb throws a javelin at its neck but it just bounces off. Iron tusk yells “Pork chop sandwichs!” to Nel. Brom asks Oxon how do we fight this thing? He tells Brom, we might not be able to it.

The pony demon charges Nel, the tentacles are all over, one hits the reins tied down one and it frees the horse and it takes off. Brom and Oxon run off yelling, “Run!” Degarius throws a dagger and the demon cries out in pain. Lucisios gets knocked into the fire. Astrid plants his spear and the demon stops for a moment. Cuthumb tries to grab the back tentacle but is unable to. Bo grabs Lucious. The pony demon take a bite out of Astrid. Nel takes swing at it, with no luck. A tenticle slashs nel and it burns. Nel tries to scoop up Cuthumb and we jump up on Irontusk. Cuthumb yells out, “Get out of there Bo!”. Cuthumb is looking back as he is yelling to see Bo getting tossed up like a rag doll. He crashes into the cart. Brom sees this too but it looks like a large body, so either Bo or a horse. Brom asks if there a way to set a ward if they distracted the beast to protect those in the ward? Irontusk runs Nel and Cuthumb back. Nel … does something. Cuthumb jumps off and runs to Bo. Brom takes a shot at it. Bo is tossed away. Cuthumb looks dumbfounded as Bo was there… but not anymore. Cuthumb drops his sword, grabs his horn, and blows it. Brom then yells to Nel to lead it away but Nel doesn’t seem to hear him. Nel gets to Bo and jumps off. Tells Bo to get on Irontusk, then tells Irontusk to meet him at the road, but take the long way. Irontusk doesn’t seem to want to leave his side. Nel starts running towards Brom and them. Irontusk is following him.

Brom goes back to the camp after the demon chases after Nel and Irontusk. He sees Degarius’s cat over and heads out from Astrids body.

Cylus has been running the town treating Nel like he’s the leader which is pissing off stonehelm.

Cylus expects the rangers to act as scouts for the army.

Bo see’s Brom and he’s as Oxen’s house. Something really jacked up Oxen. Brom is trying to help Oxen out.

It’s been 3 days.
Soldiers have moved into every building in the town. We wake up to the sound construction, trees are falling, walls are being hammered. Cylus has moved the command center into the central tower. One of the things Nel is concerned about Cylus trying to order around the rangers. Cylus’s second in command is a Phillip ?. He’s a hardass. He’s seen a lot. He tell’s Nel that the rangers need to scout the road going North 1/2 a day out and 1/2 day back. All the reports indicate that Levanne left the attack on Rangwood and went to Hammerhold.

Bo found some robes and his keeping out of sight, out of mind. He seems to know these soldiers or at least where they are from.

Cuthumb is tempted by some of the shiny weapons the soldiers bring in when they are coming in to rest and gamble.

Nel tracks down this Gilbert guy. His house is filled with books. As Nel approaches the door, Gilbert opens the door and pulls him in. Nel is told by Gilbert that he doesn’t like the army here. Gilbert would almost rather be under attack by the orcs. This is a common sentiment of the people of North due to the Empire leaving the people of the North. Nel tells him about defending the town. Nel tells Gilbert about him seeing his brother and this sanctuary to the North. Gilbert tells him it’s called Milgard. Gilbert wants to come with Nel to Milgard. He’s confident he can find it. Nel finds out it’s in the hill country. It’s built to be not found easily. It’s approx. two days travel. Nel tells someone from the Empire he needs a shield if they expect them to do this escort mission. Nel looks at the shield it has a empire symbol on it. It looks like a sun with a ring around it. Stonehelm sees Nel and starts laying into him about how Nel sold him out. Stonehelm cocks an eyebrow unsure what to believe. Stonehelm, takes Nel’s word on it and lightens up a bit. Stonehelm wishes Nel the best of luck.

Cuthumb is walking around during this. He’s been fortunate throwing the bones with some empire soldiers. It’s late morning he’s walking around with a cloaked man following him. There’s some other soldiers that have had their eye on Cuthumb. There’s some mistrust and preconception of Cuthumb. Cuthumb is grabbed and his glove is removed. There he is, we found him, branded a traitor they say. Bo is getting pissed. His hood comes back and takes a suckerpunch to the chin. He’s “seein’ red”. Bo looks back and see’s this big empire soldier. He says “I thought that was you.” Bo gives this guy a stare. He looks familiar but he can’t quite place it. He quips, “You can have a free shot bitch.” The soldier is delusional, trying to prove himself. The soldier has a bunch of rings on his right hand. The soldier swings at Bo and Bo blocks a punch and Bo is hit by the second punch but it looks like it did nothing. Bo coming in and gets in him an arm lock and is about to knee’d. However this soldier has something to prove and gets out of the arm lock. Bo is grabbing this soldier, and he’s going at it.

Meanwhile, Cuthumb tries to escape out of this grab but the soldier holds him stead and starts dragging him to the front of town.

Back at the fight, Bo and them are trading blows, and it seems the soldier is getting some solid hits on him. Bo can feel he has him close and he’s hurt. Bo has him in a hold the soldier is trying to get out of it.

Cuthumb tries to take his dagger and as he’s reaching, Cuthumb gets punch’d across the face. He’s feeling slapped around by a soldier.

Bo makes this guy cry for uncle.

Nel sees a soldier bringing a child up to the tower. He looks closer and notices that’s no child and sees Cuthumb. Bo isn’t far behind him and hits someone in the face and knocks someone out and people spread out around Bo as to not invoke this fight.

Nel stops the soldier and tells him that this person is needed for this mission. Nel tells him I am a night of north and the commander’s resolve falters. The soldier pushes Cuthumb to Nel and tells him he’s his responsibility. Cuthumb has a problem with Nel’s new shield. There’s some horses and IronTusk, he is still a little hurt, he could be ridden at this point.

Nel looks tracks down Degarius, Brom, and Gilbert. He lets us know we are going to go check on Serna. He also pulls a militia guy to come with us and head back to town to report.

There’s soldiers coming from the South road paying extra attention to Bo.

Nel is near the well. Irontusk is near the tower. A mob comes up towards Nel and tears off the Empire emblem. A matching force of Militia comes out axe drawn. Cylus comes out and is asking what’s going on? Cylus tells his men to stand down. Cylus tells Nel he wants to review whats going on over the next couple of days. Bo and Cuthumb head to the tavern, Two Hammers, to get a drink. Nel goes to the tower and Nel sees IronTusk scratching at his wound. Nel walks to IronTusk and gives him some attention and returns to Cylus. IronTusk looks well. IronTusk’s ears are flicking back and forth. He’s acting nervous. Nel tries to get some feel from IronTusk as to what might be bothering him. It seems IronTusk is ready to go. He’s uneasy about the something here. The soldiers, maybe, the commander, maybe. He’s giving Nel the signal to mount up and get out of town. At Two Hammers, Bo and Cuthumb arrive. There’s a middle aged widow who flirts with everyone. She’s gone right now as she left town before. Now there’s a cook from the empire army running the bar. Cuthumb notices a shield that isn’t marked in the tavern.

Back at the tower. Nel is talking with Cylus and they speak about how there’s some pent up energy. There’s a map Cylus pulls out. The map is faded and rough around the edges. He shows the clay bases with flags on them. He needs Nels help where Rangwood is. Nel corrects where the flag is. There’s a faded mark on the map where the temple is. This is a handdrawn map. Brom enters the room while they are talkin about the fight Nel and the rangers fought with the goblins. Brom tells Nel they need to talk. Brom and Nel goes off into a corner. Brom tells Nel that he believes one of the five demons is here. It’s not that Lavein, but one of the other ones. Nel says I am not sure who it’s emboding. Nel feels like it’s here for us. I don’t think the Dark Lord wants the nights of the North around anymore. Brom wants to get Oxen unless we want to leave him to die. Brom leaves, he asks where Bo and Cuthumb are. He tells him they went and got a drink. Nel finishes talking with Cylus. Cylus tells Nel, “We depending on the Rangers before, and we are depending on you guys again.” Nel says the North doesn’t need to be reminded about duty and then walks away.

Brom finds Cuthumb and Bo. We walked up to a wagon and get the cart and a pony and we get Oxen and some supplies. We got two militia guys, one from the town that vanished and one from this town.

It’s about mid-day and we head out and we look back at Rangwood. It looks pretty repaired, the gate that is. Brom remembers this was the last place he saw Melka.

Cuthumb makes his way back to the main hall with Bo. Bo is covered with mud and is a huge mess. Nel is ahead of me and Bo getting into the hall. We see this wolf like lady barking orders at Nel to help her bring Brom down these steps inside the main hall.

Nel had come in with Irontusk who was impaled with a spear. WolfLady helps Nel by removing the spear and applies some healing salve to the wound. Nel then talks to a warrior dressed just like him. He sits a table and they talk.

Brom wakes up and gives WolfLady a hand.

Cuthumb goes and somehow calms a horse down and checks all the walls for injured militia. He brings in who he can but also notices there is a surrounding fog around the whole town. It is later day but it feels weird. The light is dim it’s as if the fog has entirely surrounded the town. He also notes there are no goblin or orc bodies. Not even at the South East gate where he knew there were some. He tells Nel and then gets a bite to eat at the hall and falls asleep on his plate of turkey and potatoes.

Brom had joined Cuthumb eating at the hall. He had fallen asleep and was dreaming. He remembers he was really high with Oxen, and WolfLady. They were doing a chant over a large cauldron. The Cauldron is frothing over. He can see this fog rolling out where is boiling and frothing. There’s lightning hitting the cauldron. They all keep chanting and then he wakes up. It must be early because most are still sleeping. Brom goes back to the tower and to the top level. He finds the cauldron, and he can see it’s charred. It looks like it’s been used for a very very long time. He doesn’t see Oxen anywhere. He stands in the spot he remembers it more vividly. Oxen no where to be seen. Brom looks out and sees fog all around the town. The sky is grey. Brom sees Nel getting out the sleeping quarters. Francis is walking around in a apron. Brom asks Francis if he’s seen Oxen at all. He hadn’t seen him. He was surprised not seeing him healing the wounded. Francis starts to make some breakfast.

Cuthumb wakes up and takes a bite out of his bread pillow.

Nel had fallen asleep too. He wakes up and the day is still odd. There’s a weird light. It’s like there’s a fog still over everything. Nel is checking out the town. He gets to where the combat had occurred. He sees a dead horse and nothing else. Nel can see the signs of the battle. He sees Stonehelm is tired, and needing to get some rest. Nothing suspicious occurred over the watch. People seem to think they saw figures in the fog but no one can be sure. Nel hasn’t seen Bo in a while. A militia offers to fix up Nel’s shield.

Brom and the WolfLady go back to the top level of the main hall, where they talk about what happened the night before. He tells her he remembers he helped cast some spell that made a fog. Oxen is the one that cast the spell and they helped him cast it. She fears the town was moved into the spirit world. She says the spell is going to wear to where it was. She is unsure if it goes back exactly when they left of if time passes when they get back.

Brom shares this with Nel and the group.

We all seem to remember that Bo is missing. Cuthumb looks for Bo and find him near the the South East gate. He is walking towards the fog. Cuthumb gets in front of him and gets his attention. Bo tells Cuthumb he saw Serna and Lyssa out in the fog. They walked through the town and into the fog. Bo and Cuthumb share this with the group. They need help he says. Brom says we can’t do anything until the fog clears. As he says that the clouds above the town start to clear. Light starts flashing. We must hurry. Grish says he shouldn’t be moved for another day or two.

Brom sees the caretaker of the cemetery. Brom see’s him dressed in his plate armor which is odd. He is walking up on the road and takes a left towards the fog and starts walking. Brom yells to him to stop. He doesn’t seem to hear him. Brom gets into a run and run towards him. Brom catches up to him 30 feet to the Fog. “Melka Melka Melka, you can’t go into the fog” Melka says, “My whole unit’s here, and this is where I belong.” Brom turns and looks and sure enough he sees a whole grouped dressed like that. Brom is at a loss of words and Melka walks into the fog.

Brom sees Samwell and Samwell tells him he has something to tell him. Brom says, “is it really you?” Samwell tells him, “The dark lord is here, and demons in places they shouldn’t be. Hammerhold will fall from within.” Brom asks him where had he gone. “Don’t go ranging alone”

At the keep, Cuthumb sees Degarius with a woman, it’s odd though her eyes look familiar. Degarius and the woman look at eachother and then the floor shakes and it goes dark.

Nel is with Iron tusk. Nel goes to see if there’s bodies in the town to assess if he’s back at the same time. He looks and listens, he doesn’t see or hear anything suspicious. Nel feels a wind which wasnt there the last few days. It’s a little chilly due to the night time.

Brom can see the damage to the town then to the woods. Nothing is coming towards the town but he does see a large body at the front gate. Brom lead those out of town back to the town.

Nel and Grish are trying to settle Irontusk down.

Cuthumb looks over and sees the cat again and Degarius is distraught. He hears as well as everyone else the sound of the empire.

We sleep the night and in the morning sure enough there’s an empire scouting unit come in to the town.

They are brought up to speed by Nel. They’d like to use Rangewood as a base of operations for a while. Cuthumb started laying low.

The battle continues

The battle’s been going on, for ~ 90 minutes. Its been stop and go. Over the next 30 minutes we held our own. Brom left with the town healer. Bo is still on the South East wall. Cuthumb helped keep Bo stocked with arbalest bolts.

Cuthumb runs out to get some more bolts as he barely gets back before an bunch of orcs approach the South East wall. Cuthumb noticed the orc warlord Garruth. Bo tells Cuthumb to get help from the North West wall.

Cuthumb gets to the North West wall. He hears a loud crashing and whistling. Cuthumb gets around the building quick enough to see this boulder smashing out of a building with a rope trailing behind. He moves closer and gets a good look at the boulder, it has a smooth black surface and is cut at odd angles causing it to roll funny, it has a hole carved through the middle which is where the rope has been fed through and tied. The boulder rolls as if a magical force is pulling it back towards the forest, picking up speed as it goes. Cuthumb thinks it’s a good idea to grab the large rope. He grabs it and is pulled off of his feet and is dragged towards Nel and the North West entrance. Nel cuts the rope and the boulder continues. Cuthumb tells Nel we need men at the South West entrance, it’s being attacked and won’t hold for long.

Nel grabs a groups of mounted militia and heads through town to the South entrance. With the South entrance coming into view an ambush is sprung with a rope being pulled up across the road. Two of the mounted militia hit the rope and are thrown from their horses. Goblins run into the road to attack while a goblin on the roof fires arrows down onto the group. Cuthumb jumps from the back of Irontusk and Nel spurs Irontusk forward attempting to save the fallen militia men. The battle is over quickly ending with Cuthumb sending the goblin archer to the dirt with a well placed thrown spear. Nel stops to survey the damage, 6 dead goblins lay in the street along side 2 dead militia men and one of the town horses with another militia injured. Nel curses the Dark Lord and wheels Irontusk back in the direction of the South gate, Cuthumb jumping behind him as the boar starts to run.
By the time we got to the South East Entrance it was all but destroyed. Cuthumb starts looking for Bo in the rubble getting help from several near by survivors. Nel looks over the scene trying to devise a plan for how to defend the area and sees goblins and orcs climbing into Rangewood just North of the fallen gate. He yells to the men around him to charge the enemy and he and Irontusk take the vangard with a battle cry. “Charge!”
Garruth stands in the center of the attacking goblins and lets out a warcry of his own, charging the defenders down the dark street. Before Nel is able to engage, Garruth throws his spear and it hits Irontusk squarely in the shoulder with a meaty chunk. It’s legs buckle and it lets out a cry as it slids in the dirt. Nel is able to keep from being thrown but doesn’t have time to care for Irontusk as the enemy is on top of them. He jumps in front of Irontusk and thrusts his spear at Garruth, trying to make him pay but the Orc warlord is too fast and dodges to the side swinging his heavy blade down on Nel. Nel is able to get his shield up just in time and the orc blade splits the shield down to Nel’s arm. Garruth uses his sword stuck in the shield to hold Nel’s arm out while getting close in and grabbing Nel’s throat with his free hand. “Time to die Night of the North” Garruth yells as he digs his claws into Nel’s neck then throws him over his dieing boar.

Cuthumb finds Bo’s hand in the rubble and directs the men to help him pull the wreckage off of his friend. He is able to move a board uncovering Bo’s tatooed face. Bo looks up at the smiling halfling just in time to see him get pulled up into the air. The attacking giant swings Cuthumb by the back of his shirt swinging him from side to side knocking the men helping dig out Bo out of the way. The giant than flips Cuthumb in the air trying to grab him by his legs but the halfling is too quick and kicks himself free landing with a crunch on the rubble. Bo sees the giant reach down for the little guy again and pushes with a roar. He jumps free, grabs the giants out streched arm and pushes with everything he has and they both tumble into the moat outside the broken wall.

Nel lay gasping for air, his head in a in a fog. He knew he needed to get up or the goblins would be on him but his body wouldn’t respond. Then he heard his brother’s voice “Little brother, must I always save you?” Nel caught a glimpes of him as he turned and waded into the goblins with blade flashing. His brothers voice replaced with the cries of goblins being cut down. “No!” he yelled and forced his legs to get him back in the fight, he rose behind IronTusk. As his vision cleared he realized that it was Daggarias and not his brother that attacked the goblins and Irontusk had gotten up and was defending him thrashing his head back and forth to keep Garruth and the goblins away from him. Blood foamed at his mouth and Nel could hear him struggle to breath but the giant boar fought on to protect it’s master. Nel took his spear in both hands now that his shield was broken and jumped past Irontusk at Garruth. He thrust parried and thrust again sending the orc backwards into a wooden fence. There was a pause in the action, lightning flashed as Garruth lifted his hand to wipe blood from his cheek. The sight of the wound infuriated him and he lunged towards Nel trying to end the fight. The two engaged in a frenzied melee in the middle of the street with more flashes of lightning. Each trying to get the advantage, each fighting to kill the other. A deep fog quickly settled on the battlefield. Nel attacked forward but Garruth was gone.

Bo finally got the advantage on the giant, he was covered in muck and blood from grappling in the muddy moat but he was finally in position to win when the fog settled over him and he felt the giant slip through his grasp. “Magic” he growled under his breath.

The group were able to find each other and they made their way to the keep in the center of town where Cuthumb had last seen Brom. They needed to heal and find out what happened.

Human (good fighter) Redshirt2 Female Caspy, least skilled out of the three

Elf (archer) Redshirt3 ? Male Pirin

Nel sent the Redshirts out on a scouting mission around Rangewood. Nel wants to know where the army is as opposed to just waiting to see what happens. Dauntless wants to send guys to the closest South Eastern town to get assistance from the empire. Nel wants to , Aradale to inform the Empire.

Nel is going to have the walls manned, set up a patrol, ensure the drawbridge is functioning.

Cuthumb hears the first hornblow and can see two humans. Pirin decided to leave his party and range some more on the group towards Hammerhold. The human rangers found out that Groth seperated and is leading an army to attack Rangwood, but the rest of the forces were headed to Hammerhold.

We ran off to a lightly occupied tower. We ran through it. We got to the top floor of it. Brom through some large rubbage down the stairs and took out some fiends from it. After that a group of them came over part of the collapsed wall near the north side of the tower. As worgs and goblins overrun the tower Bo moves a heavy pillar over to stop the onslaught. The floor begins to shake and and crack and the pillar falls in where most the people fall into the hole. Brom goes to get out and Oscar reaches to help him up and asks Brom, “Do you know where the Duke’s daughter is?” Brom tells him, “I don’t know”. Oscar swings at Brom’s armor and cracks it. Brom pulls him down with him into the hole. Nel came by and saved us.

Eric’s healing folks. It’s getting darker and later. So far it appears as if the goblins have left. The area seems secure.

David suggest starting a goblin bbq for the other other white meat. We burn them up. We fortify the ranch house. We take turns doing watches.

The next day we rise. It’s a clear day. Mr. Sine is sending one of his daughters with ‘cause he wants to know whats up. Jesse’s all about this. We get all set with our gear and we notice that Horus is not with us. It was discussed that he left after cuthumb after david but never was seen after. David, and Cuthumb ride out and look for him. David finds the scent and finds him 1/2 hour past where cuthumb was. Horus is there with his dog and three dead Goblins and opens with “About time you guys show up.” David lays into him about how he was needed at the ranch and he was an idiot with his new found leader ship.

We get back to the ranch and start to head out to the White oak Ruins. We are on our gaurd as we just got out of an encounter w/goblins. About 1/2 the day passes. We come down this valley and this is where that big battle was. On the eastern side is a bluff where a castle was built into the side. Part of the valley is now occupied by a village. It’s a small settlement. We don’t see any army out here. We enter the village to speak to some of the people. People look at us a little funny. Maddie leads us to this man at the wind/water mill. Cuthumb talks his way into the room. He has some tables he sits us at. He tells us they had an issue last night even. It doesn’t seem like there’s any army. This man tells us of a man with a cat who came through from the North to the ruins. We get some lunch and drink some ale. The innkeeper says the goblins see the ruins as a mystical place and leave it alone. he tells us how to get into the ruins. We decide to go into the ruins. It’s near noon in the spring time. We have a lot of daylight left. We get to the cliff-face. 20 feet of hard climbing then stairs into the castle. Bo sees this rope by climbing it. In no time he’s up. He turns to us and says “It’ll hold.” Cuthumb climbs up and it takes him a little bit longer but he gets there. Our stays behind and waits to tell us that he’s coming … never. Maddie also stays back. Eric is leading. Horus is behind him. Then Bo, and Cuthumb. Horus has a lantern lit. From Cuthumbs angle it appears as if Bo’s tattoo is lighting up. The walkway opens up into a big room. We can see very little of it.

There’s a fire in the and a haggered looking ranger named,Degaries sitting crossed legged we approch him. He looks like a scout. We exchange some words of what we’re looking for. We are looking for an army for the gobin variety, and he is chasing a ghost.

At the entrance, David and the boar are walking around the castle. Iron tusk tries to dig through some specific rubble. David just watches.

Back in the room Degarius says the lights didn’t lit up until our group arrived. … Weird He tells us of a name Lavein, a demon whose killed a number of folks. Sailors picked up a beatiful woman out on the sea. It ended with the people killing themselves. This man traced her down this way.

Degarius says theres an old anicent thing at the top of the bluff. he brings us to the top. Bo grabs two of the laterns and follows Degarius to the top of the bluff. There’s a collapsed room that has a sunlight. We see this huge oak tree.

David and the boar find this huge oak door after some more digging. Maddie tells david “Why don’t you help him, let him do all the work” David says “why dont you help him!?” It takes them a little while. Finally they have enought pulled out they get a door exposed. She crushed one of her fingers. Iron tusk is makeing a hole in the door. Iron tusk goes threough. David follows him into this big long room. it’s dark. It smells. It looks like a stable. It appears abandoned. The stables are lamon sized stables could fit war boars or war horses.

Meanwhile the other group is uptop of this bluff. This tree is supposed to be spiritual. Degarius came to this for some personal answers. He walks up to the tree. The cat is unusually shapped. The cat had bigger ears, with grey fur. It would be huge for a house cat. Bo walks up to the tree and he touches it. Then he places the other lantern down and touches it and hit tattoo lights up. Degarius jumps back and watches Bo’s tattoo.

Bo has a vision…

Eric is off exploring. There’s several spots where castle has opened up. He noticed something moving through the grass….The cat jumps up and sprints towards teh collapesd room. Lyssa starts running to the room.